If it were
evening when the thing happened the two people got out of the lighted house
where they had been sitting together, each feeling darkness would help the
effort they were both making to tear away the wall. They walked along a
lane, past the barns and over the little wooden bridge across the stream
that ran down through the barnyard. Hugh did not want to talk of the work
at the shop, but could find words for no other talk. They came to a fence
where the lane turned and from where they could look down the hillside and
into the town. He did not look at Clara but stared down the hillside and
the words, in regard to the mechanical difficulties that had occupied his
mind all day, ran on and on. When later they went back to the house he felt
a little relieved. "I've said words. There is something achieved," he
thought.
* * * * *
And now after the three years as a married woman Clara sat in the motor
with her father and husband and with them was sent whirling swiftly through
the summer night. The car ran down the hill road from the Butterworth farm,
through a dozen residence streets in town and then out upon the long,
straight roads in the rich, flat country to the north. It had skirted
the town as a hungry wolf might have encircled silently and swiftly the
fire-lit camp of a hunter. To Clara the machine seemed like a wolf, bold
and cunning and yet afraid.
Pages:
339
340
341
342
343
344
345
346
347
348
349
350
351
352
353
354
355
356
357
358
359
360
361
362
363